


Via, Via

by bold_seer



Category: In Bruges (2008)
Genre: Depression, Dreams vs. Reality, Guilt, M/M, Post-Canon, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-15
Updated: 2017-06-15
Packaged: 2018-11-12 05:30:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11155233
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bold_seer/pseuds/bold_seer
Summary: Some hallucination brought on by a strong cocktail and too much Bruges; a man could go mad here.





	Via, Via

**Author's Note:**

  * For [days4daisy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/days4daisy/gifts).



> _He said, ‘Ken, I know I’m awake, but I feel like I’m in a dream.’_  
>  \- Ken, _In Bruges_

The clock kept blinking, and he knew he was awake. Uncomfortably sweaty and shivering at once, almost feverish. But the hotel room felt vague and blurry round the edges like an old pair of glasses, an expired prescription his vision wasn’t used to anymore, new and old in one. Like there was something wrong with him, like he couldn’t see straight. And something in him hurt.

He came back to himself. He’d thought – yesterday, it was yesterday? – in some anxious moment, when he’d woken up during the night with tears in his eyes and a racing heartbeat, that he should kill himself, convinced that that was the only way out. But maybe that was some coke-fuelled paranoia. Now the pendulum had swung back with vengeance, to the exact opposite end. Ray might have felt shitty about his continued existence, but faced with his own mortality, he didn’t actually _want_ to die, and definitely not here, not now, not in Bruges, and never get to leave the fucking place, ever.

And anyway, he had unfinished business left, and he didn’t want to be that guy who leaves a mess behind, not after –

Ray could still make things better somehow, even though he couldn’t make things go away, couldn’t make anyone come back to life.

He was staring at the door like it was the key to something, though he didn’t really want to go anywhere either. What was there to see? In _Bruges_. Then he heard noise from the corridor and the door opened. Hesitantly, miserably, as if Ken was the one who didn’t know how to be there, was tired of Bruges, tired of everything. And – it was just fucking weird, wasn’t it? Or maybe it was the look on Ken’s face or something, because Ray _knew_.

“I have a gun. I’m going to shoot myself. But I don’t. You have a gun. You’re going to shoot me. But you won’t.”

He didn’t know why he said it, but it hurt. Ken had meant to shoot him, even just for a moment. He also knew Ken would never do it. Not even on Harry’s orders.

But why the fuck wouldn’t he? Why wouldn’t Ken shoot him, the stupid dumb fuck? Get in trouble with Harry instead.

That wasn’t why he felt sick looking at Ken, almost as guilty and miserable as Ken looked. “You fell, or jumped –” Ray blurted out.

Maybe it was the coke. Some hallucination brought on by a strong cocktail and too much Bruges; a man could go mad here.

“Fell?”  


It had to be the coke.

“Out of the fucking tower.”

Like some bird that was too old, or too fat, or too tired to fly anymore. Or like he was jumping from the world’s highest diving platform. Except there wasn’t anything to jump into, not even a canal, even though they were everywhere, so he just - splash - hit the ground.

And Harry was – Harry had killed Ken?  


Maybe Ray deserved it, because of everything, but shit, Ken probably didn’t. Even though he’d shot people, too. Just not kids.  


And Ray wanted to cry like a sissy because he’d killed a boy and now, later, at some point Ken was going to lie bleeding in front of that bell tower, that stupid bell tower he’d liked. Just because he refused to kill Ray. They were all going to die in Bruges. Even Harry, the wanker. In fucking Bruges. Jesus, that was tragic.

Ken and Harry, an angel and a devil, playing tug of war for his soul, if he had one. Or actually just his life, which probably shouldn’t have been worth much to anyone but himself. Not even himself, most of the time.

Except maybe Chloe, though Chloe was probably better off without him, even though she robbed tourists and shit.

Maybe the owner, the pregnant lady. She wouldn’t much like Ray, because he didn’t even like Bruges. But she was probably also a nice normal person who didn’t want people dead in general, and didn’t deserve to witness a gangster shootout.

Even though she did own a hotel in Bruges and not the Bahamas or anywhere else Ray would maybe, maybe have liked enough to stay in to die in. But she couldn’t help being Belgian, could she? That’s just how things were. Some people had to live in Belgium and not the Bahamas, or the place would sink from all the millions of people and all the fat American tourists, and then everyone in the Bahamas would end up somewhere worse - like Belgium for instance.

And maybe he knew why Ken hadn’t wanted to shoot him, maybe it was obvious all along. Ken, who still wore a wedding ring. Sentiment. Enough to die for him, even though he maybe hadn’t meant to. Or maybe he had, and that, shit.

Ray didn’t want to look at Ken, who reminded him of Ken last night, when he’d asked whose side he was supposed to be on, and Jimmy the midget - the dwarf had said he should weigh his options (but what if all the options were piss poor, what then?). He looked out the window instead. It was snowing. It hadn’t snowed before.

_Do anything, Ray. Do anything._

So he ran down the stairs and out into the street, where the ground was growing whiter. Big flakes raining down, in slow motion. And he just stood under the falling snow, like that was all there was. Like he was trapped there, in Belgium, in Bruges, inside a snow globe.

Suddenly he was really cold. Maybe Bruges _was_ hell, and this was it, the final stop.

Or it wasn’t hell, because it was fucking freezing. Instead like that other place, in the painting with the weird little figures, and he wasn’t ever going to leave, dead or alive, until he’d been judged. Like a film that wasn’t over yet, he wouldn’t ever reach the train station, even if he waded through the snow, or the train would stop in some halfway place every time he tried.

He looked up and Ken wasn’t there anymore, not even a ghostly presence in the window, or maybe Ray just couldn’t see him. Everything around him was white, and he knew he was awake, but it felt like he was in a dream that was about to end.


End file.
